When the Dam Breaks – The Gospel Engagement Imperative

By P. Douglas Small
President, PRAYER AT THE HEART

A Parody

Imagine that you live in a little valley town. It’s a sweet place with lush meadows and a quiet stream that meanders through the village. There are legends, now treated as rumors, as fairy tales, that the city founders had been warned about settling in the valley. They were told, that high in the mountains, there was a powerful spring and a large lake with a natural dam. One day, the lake, some feared, might overflow or what might be even more devastating, the dam might rupture and flood waters might race down the mountain and destroy the city.

But, alas, the valley is such a lovely place and the village so peaceful – and the natural dam so solid and secure, the settlers concluded, it provided no threat. Occasionally, the little town’s streets are water-logged, and its little creek overflowed, but not severely and not frequently. Once, rumor has it, the whole village was underwater, but no one believes the myth about that flood. That story is kept alive by a minority of folks, the same group that stirs up concerns on occasion about the dangers of the dam breaking.

Occasionally, a mountaineer descends into the valley and reports that the lake, now laden with chemicals, fed by sulfur and acidic compounds, is expanding and threatens to overflow the dam. He reports seeing cracks in the natural dam. But such warnings are not heeded. Such hill folks are dismissed – they are not experts, or scientists, or seismologists, just crackpots and fear mongers, looking for attention, it is claimed. “Those cracks have been there of centuries,” the disbelieving responds. “If there is a problem with the dam, we’ll know,” the city fathers assure everyone. “We’re safe.”

The town grew up, downstream, knowing about the contaminated lake. Formed years ago, by a now dormant lovely volcano, the mouth of the once fiery volcano is now decorated with flowers in the Spring and capped with snow in the winter. It seems to pose no threat at all. The beautiful and lush valley in which the villagers live was created by the fiery crater that now seems a world away. Only a few people even know this history when they choose the little hamlet as home – and what a lovely place.

Occasionally a seismic event gets their attention and spices up community conversation for a few days, but the shakings are infrequent and always mild. In the past, some gathered and prayed for safety when a shaking came. In time, most villagers felt that such gatherings didn’t abate fears, but escalated them. Such actions, they believed, gave credence to “the myths.”

Now, they no longer fear. They heed no warnings. “Has anyone personally seen the lake or the volcano? Has the water there been tested?” – the more skeptical ask. Few have launched a personal investigation. They don’t study, most simply assume, taking the word of others, conceding to the prevailing consensus. “There is no need for alarm, no danger – God, if He does exist, is far away, and if he does act, it always with kindness and gentleness.”

Recently, one of the hill people came through the city again after another seismic event. A few considered leaving the village or moving to higher ground, or into a new community. The dangers of living below the volcano-formed lake were grave, the circulating report asserted. But the counter message muted fears, “The lake is miles from here. And that mammoth natural dam, cracking? It’s been there for centuries – it has always had cracks,” the scoffers contended. “The volcano explode? Never. We’re in no danger. Look around at this peaceful place. The crackpots call this a dangerous place to live?”

I submit – the story is a fable, and yet!

The whole world lives in that valley. Creation is groaning – and an explosion of global proportions is due. The lake is full of toxins – full to the brim. The dam is cracking. A tsunamic of judgment is building and will, according to Scripture, be released in a season of global tribulation. The Scripture predicts an escalation – tribulation, troubles (Mt. 24:9; Mk. 4:17); and then great tribulation (Mt. 24:15, 21; Mk. 13:14); and finally, with no repentance, with entrenched resistance to God and rejection of Christ – the outpouring of the wrath of God.

This will come on “every soul of man who does evil,” Jew and Greek (Rom. 2:9). Sadly, few messengers now move through the city, offering a means of salvation. The city now disapproves of such messengers. There is consideration being given to making the message itself illegal and arresting those who disturb the villages peace.

It should never be the intent of the messengers, believers, to disturb the peace of the city. Rather, the message is one of peace, and the result is a condition of both inner peace and reconciliation. That’s why Paul argues, despite this backdrop of wrath, that we should “glory in tribulations” (Rom. 5:3). That is, in times of trouble, our witness to those around us should escalate. And the character of that witness should be positive, not negative. We are to be messengers of hope – not wrath. We realize that “nothing can separate us from the love of Christ” (Rom. 8:35). That is the essence of our message – a message of hope, to a world under wrath.

Understanding God’s Wrath

Wrath, in Greek, is orgé. It means impulse, passion, vengeance, or retribution (Strong’s # 3709). From orgáō, it means to teem or to swell. Applied to God, it indicates His constitutional opposition to sin and unrighteousness. It is an expression of His fixed nature – not a mere or momentary reaction. It is not a sudden, uncontrolled burst of divine anger.

Luther said God’s wrath is His “alien work.” God’s disposition is holiness. From that, there comes, of necessity, a settled anger and opposition against sin. This disposition rises out of His holy nature, and does so without mutating or diminishing His love, His mercy or the offer of forgiveness. God knows the dreadful end of sin, and that animates His concern. Sin is an enemy that poses a deadly danger.

God is continuously animated, in a protective sense, over the lethal impact of sin on humans, even when they self-infect themselves. He still cares. He is compassionate, loving, but His holiness is at the core of His nature. Sin is not a mere idea. It is not arbitrary. Sin is calculable, reckonable, computable, and it manifests in tangible, measurable, and deadly ways. It must be confined, isolated as if it were a virus or nuclear waste. It is not merely ethereal or imaginary, as we tend to think.

God’s wrath rises from this fixed, principled opposition that steadfastly opposes someone or something decadent or unjust and evil. His love does not eclipse His holiness. It constrains, but it does not abort due justice. That person who is creating, manufacturing, and dispensing sin are on God’s radar screen. That individual who is a carrier of the disease, knowingly, carelessly, is under divine surveillance. This is not God’s sudden and impulsive reaction. It is a constant, settled disposition against sin and the intentional sinner and on behalf of the vulnerable. Thus, we pray, “…lead us not into temptation and deliver us from evil,” actually, from the Evil One.

It is the same vigilance that a responsible parent exercises when a vulnerable child is near some danger. The parent sends a warning, “Be careful,” but the threat remains. The actions of the child are still both free and impulsive, and therefore dangerous. Vigilance is demanded of a family on behalf of such little ones when they live on a busy street. The fence establishes a boundary and the gate is locked, but the dangers still lurk. What if the child or someone else opens the gate? What if a stranger entices them into harm’s way? What if? The child can only learn and grow with freedom. And the child can only enjoy that freedom if they learn restraint. All the while, the parent is vigilant, watchful, poised for protective action, as is God, our Father.

“The wrath of God,” Paul asserts, “is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness” (Romans 1:18). This is a work that is already in progress. It began at the cross. Still, this is a stunning opening declaration in the book of Romans about the wrath of God. God cares, He wants us to be aware of the destructive forces that threaten the earth and human life. That is good news! But, there is also bad news – ungodliness and wickedness are escalating, truth is being suppressed, despite the fact that the world is under judgment. That specifically includes those who dismiss sin’s consequences and suppress the truth, denying God’s role as Creator and as being worthy of worship.

Watching the Cracks in the Dam

1. Rejecting God. God can be known, through Creation, and by His interventions in history (1:19-20), but earth’s creatures who knew God, nevertheless, withheld worship.

The result is clouded thinking (rational diminution) and the heart lights (spiritual intuition) that go out. The consequences are profound. This shift away from God involves the embrace of evolution and, eventually, earth worship. With the embrace of evolution and the elevation of the animal kingdom to the state of reverence (idolatry), humanity turns off both spiritual perception and sound logic. Then, irreligious, and arrogantly, they claim higher wisdom and advanced enlightenment. This is the revival of gnostic notions, and we are witnessing such a revival today. Wise, by their own standards, they plummet, unaware, to the behavioral profile of a “fool.”

2. Becoming Enlightened Fools. The Greek word is mórainó (Strong’s # 3471), which means to be a fool or turn to foolishness. Here is Paul, slamming these self-perceived intellectuals. They have abandoned God and now stand without God, and pretentiously above God.

They present themselves as educated, wise, and elite. Actually they are foolish, mōrós (Strong’s 3474), from which we get our word, moron. Without a heart that is spiritually alive, and with a closed mind, they become dull and sluggish. The idea means, without an edge – they are flat, no longer sharp! Consequently, they talk stupid and act silly. Ah, but with a deceptive air of sophistication, with delusional self-confidence decorated with fifty-cent words.

3. Inverting Values – Idolatry. Paul then describes a critical shift, like an iceberg that flips, like a faulty compass that reads wrongly, as north becomes south, and up is down. In our age, good is now bad, and evil is openly celebrated.

Created in God’s image, now fallen humanity, designed to carry God’s glory, shifts their identity from heaven to earth, from the Creator to the animal kingdom, from belief in creation to evolutionary theory. The withheld worship, an innate drive, is now rechanneled to venerate “images of mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles” (Rom. 1:23).

Here worship is refashioned by the culture into idolatry. With humanity at the top of the evolutionary totem pole and nothing above them, man reverences the wild and untamed creatures of the animal world. He reimagines his own image as a reincarnation of such primitive spirits. He is an animal, nothing more. With this shift – culture implodes. Rules are gone. Immorality reigns. Identities are confused. Mental illness escalates (Rom. 1:24-28).

The three-fold repetition, “God gave them up…” uses the term, paradidomi. It is a legal concept, meaning to hand over or release a criminal. It is then, judicial. God is judging. He is handing over humanity to their own errors. This is the abandonment of God, the moment in which He goes silent, having done all to awaken, to corral immorality, to speak and call men back to Himself, including coming to the earth, as a man, only to be rejected and crucified. In three trials, Paul asserts, humanity is found guilty, global culture is judged in the courtroom of heaven and then released to the consequences of their own behavior.

4. Descending into Ethical Chaos. “Therefore, God gave them over …” (1:24). A struggle is implied. Mankind is running away from God. Like a father, wrestling with a rebellious child who is determined to bolt and run, God gives up increasing control. The “desires of their hearts for impurity” is too great to constrain. Now, the lie is firmly substituted for truth. Absolute ethics and standards are gone. Relativism reigns. Now, the creature is the god, and the true Creator is out. Man, as His noble earthly representative, is lost in the evolutionary chain.

5. Declining Further – Moral Chaos. And then, there is another descent, even further into sin. It is intensified resistance against God and any moral barrier. “God gave them over to dishonorable passions.” The result is identity confusion, women, driven by passion, altering, transforming their physikós, and men doing the same, inflamed with a preference for men, instead of women – the very thing we are witnessing today (1:26).

6. The Final Descent – Mental Illness. Last, there is the final plunge into total depravity. “God… gave them up to a depraved mind.” And they were filled with every kind of wickedness. There is no reasoning in this stage. No moral argument can be made to dissuade those who embrace this level of behavior called evil by God. The culture, apart from a sovereign spiritual awakening, will now perish (1:28). It is only a matter of time.
Notice the progression. First, there is spiritual apostasy. Then moral decadence. And finally, mental illness. All know or have known, God’s righteous decrees, His perimeters for moral, social order. Still, the immoral rebellious behavior escalates, and the new behavioral standards are normalized. Such actions, such a determined decadent disposition, Paul insisted, was “worthy of death.” Against this dark background, Paul calls the church to be an agent of comfort and hope. The good news message is because of, the wrath of God, but wrath is not the message. We preach is the gospel – good news. This is grace. It is the intercessor between the wolf and the lamb, between the cracking dam and the village.

The village is in danger. Who have you told? Never mind their initial reaction, “You believe that old story? Not you?” You do believe the old story, because of the one who shared it with you – the Holy Spirit, whispering, warning, urging you to get your family and friends to a place of safety.

Will you do it?